As the rate of violence increases in society, the evidence of violence in the healthcare industry mirrors the trend. The rate of injuries from assault and violence among the healthcare and social service industry is higher than all other industries. It is estimated that nursing is four times more dangerous than the majority of all other occupations. Even more specifically, injury rates were the highest among psychiatric and substance abuse hospitals at a rate of 70.2 cases per 10,000 fulltime employees.

Despite current violence prevention guidelines, and the legal obligation of organizations to provide a safe working environment, a blanket policy and passive approach have not been significant enough to restore the safety healthcare workers deserve. Nevertheless, with collaborative efforts that focus on education, prevention, and intervention, organizations will be empowered to reinstate a secure and respectable working environment.

This purpose of this paper was to research violence prevention and intervention plans, develop a violence screening tool, and provide a prevention and intervention plan outline that incorporates the developed screening tool. This paper includes an extensive literature review, analysis of policy and practice of violence screening and prevention; the impact of violence on employee's, management, and organization, costs of workplace violence; the effectiveness of violence screening and prevention; and recommendations for implementation of a violence screening tool and an effective workplace violence prevention and intervention program.